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Context

When Edith Wharton wrote the underrated Twilight Sleep in
1927, she had spent precisely eleven days in her own country since
1913. She might, therefore, be expected to be disqualified from the
subject-matter of the novel, the post-war, Jazz Age frenzy of a
middle-aged American club-woman and do-gooder. The reverse is true:
long absence from America and second-hand familiarity with its
society and culture made perfect material for what is, with The
Custom of the Country, her most energetic satirical work.
Twilight Sleep is an extended, almost Jonsonian, caricature
of modern mores which could perhaps only have emerged from a
sensibility remote from the reality of American life.

Pauline Manford runs her life …

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11287Twilight Sleep3Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.